The Dramatists Guild Foundation (DGF), in partnership with The Lillys, have announced graduate students Darrin Terpstra and Morgan Webber-Ottey as the 2024 recipients for the Hansberry-Lilly Fellowship.
Created in honor of playwright Lorraine Hansberry (A Raisin in the Sun, The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window), the fellowships ensure that the next generation of women and non-binary playwrights of color are able to follow in Hansberry's footsteps, allowing them to create new work and develop their writing careers regardless of their economic situation.
Each recipient receives a $25,000 stipend for each year of matriculation at select writing programs across the country, with up to $75,000 available to subsidize living expenses not covered by tuition.
This year’s recipients were selected by playwright, director, and actress Seret Scott.
Darrin Terpstra is a Korean American playwright from Des Moines, Iowa. They earned a B.A. in English and Creative Writing from the University of Iowa, where their primary focus was crafting intersections between Christian theology and queer theory. Terpstra’s plays include Backyard Alien, an exploration of the transgender and immigrant metaphors within the idea of alien superheroes; This Is My Body, a depiction of two queer Southern Baptist pastors learning how to wrestle with God; and Ghost Town, a grief narrative in which two trans people attempt to summon a ghost from a local legend. Currently, they are pursuing an MFA in playwriting at Iowa Playwrights Workshop.
Morgan Webber-Ottey is a recovering lawyer-turned-drama writer, born and raised in NYC, with detours in Nashville and Madrid. Her darkly satirical, character-driven writing centers deeply flawed women of color who are often misfits or underdogs. Webber-Ottey previously worked as the script coordinator on the final 20-episode season of Manifest on Netflix, and she is a proud alum of the Writers Guild Foundation’s Writers’ Access Support Staff Training Program. Webber-Ottey holds a B.A. in American Studies from Wesleyan University, a J.D. from Vanderbilt University Law School, and is an incoming MFA candidate at Northwestern University’s Writing for the Screen + Stage.
